peds

Shall we take bets on who he really is?

I'm very happy for them.

No, but go on, sounds bloody interesting.

It is every thread, isn't it.

Is it at all confusing to see messages addressed to someone you have filtered out, with no context attached? Cripes, I wonder if I'm blocked. I wouldn’t even know if he can see this post...

Don't worry, no need to go all the way to Afghanistan after all. Putin says it was the Ukrainians. Vladimir Putin has told the Russian people that Ukraine is linked to the Crocus City Hall terror attack on Friday night that killed at least 133 people. In a video address lasting five-and-a-half minutes, the newly relected Russian president said Russian security forces believed they had apprehended all four direct participants in the attack, who were caught heading for Ukraine, which was preparing to receive them over the border. Kyiv has rubbished the claims. 11 people have been detained in total. Islamic State has claimed it carried out the attack, something which Putin did not mention in his address. He described it as a “bloody, barbaric terrorist act”, Putin said the victims were “dozens of peaceful, innocent people - our compatriots, including children, teenagers, and women”. He said the Russian Federation would “identify and punish everyone who prepared the terrorist attack”. Ukraine has denied any link to the attack. Presidential advisor Mykhailo Podolyak said attempts to connect the two were “absolutely untenable”. He said “Ukraine has not the slightest connection to this incident. Ukraine has a full-scale war with Russia and will solve the problem of Russia’s aggression on the battlefield”. Neither Putin nor the FSB publicly presented any proof of a link with Ukraine.

Oof, that's a big leap from the last time I checked. Not surprising by some of the footage though.

Apparently a cell of ISIS based in Afghanistan. Both US intelligence and the group itself claiming responsibility seems to support the idea. I'm surprised to be honest, my first thought was Putin doing it himself to muddy the waters a bit, for whatever reason he'd think it necessary. 60ish dead now, 145 injured. The gunmen are currently still at large. I suppose, logically, Vladimir will now want to divert some of his military capabilities towards Afghanistan... What could possibly go wrong!

Anyway, I'd say it's definitely worth painting the eucalyptus in the original post white. Couldn't hurt.

Oh I'm definitely not saying that's why they've done it in the pictures above, I'm just spitballing. Might just be aesthetics at times.

It'd keep a lot of creepy crawlies out of the tree, easy pickings for birds as they scuttle uptrunk. Assuming it's painted with something that won't harm the tree. There's a good few species of moth with wingless females that crawl up into trees to lay eggs, barriers are a common control for them on fruit trees. White paint might create a bit of a barrier, and feed the birds at the same time.

Yeah, anything with red gooseberries in it wouldn't last long, bloody lovely fruit. If you get any good quantity of blackcurrants and have any left after the vodka, then I can recommend making wine with them. I've made many gallons of blackcurrant wine, always worth the effort and getting better with every year of age.

I mean, it kind of is a public forum, he's allowed to share his opinion or commentary wherever he may please. I don't find myself agreeing with him very often, but he often phrases things in an entertaining way and occasionally even borders on profundity.

For cheap leg protection you're best off keeping an eye out on all the websites that do clearances every now and then, and hope there's something in your size. I've got 50, 60% off before.

Very interesting. I do suddenly wonder about cross pollination and potential hybridisation with native varieties, and the possible detrimental effects on dependant species, but those thoughts are heavily outweighed by the promise of easier hawthorn gin and pancake syrup.

Jaysus, those are some big haws. You'd not be long harvesting those. Many thorns? There's native hawthorn in every hedgerow in every direction of course, but I'd be tempted to have a tree or two of that variety tucked away somewhere if harvesting is made easier.

Just for a laugh, I started all of mine with no sugar this year (a few bottles of hawthorn gin, too), to see what they'd be like. Very astringent neat, obviously, but tempered enough by tonic alone for my own tastes, as I prefer bone-dry drinks across the board. I will end up sweetening most of them anyway I imagine, to stop my wife complaining. But I'll keep a bottle unsweetened for personal use I think. I completely forgot this year, but next year I'll do the same and start them all dry, then make a cheong syrup to sweeten with at leisure: just equal weight of sloes and sugar left in a jar for a few months until the juices are extracted and the sugar dissolved. Left long enough it starts to ferment as well, giving a slightly tart syrup.

Leave the gin on the berries until the sun turns cold. You can drink it at 3 months, but it takes time for the almond notes from the kernel to diffuse. Best left for a few years if you've got the opportunity.

Poetry.

Coal ash cannot go in the compost. Peat ash is fine, wood ash is best. Not too much. Consider adding ash after the active composting process, as it can mess with the right conditions for the fungal and bacterial biota, and allow it some time to mature before using. Add it when sifting or during the final turn, depending on your own system. Keep a bucket of ash handy for planting or top dressing potassium-heavy feeders.

I expect the minimal amount of alcohol you added didn't help anything, but there's a hell of a lot of easily-digestible calories in beer that would fuel all sorts of bacterial and fungal colonists. That would definitely liven things up a little. On that note, it's a good habit to not salt your pasta/potato/rice cooking water and throw that on your pile after it's been drained and cooled, unless you are using it in soup or sauce, or using the absorption method. Lots of precious starch going to waste if it goes down the drain.

No membrane, 3 layers of brown cardboard instead.

Are there any reports from outside the twitterverse yet? I think every few years there's a sudden celebrity death that gets cycled around on twitter before turning out to be completely false. I wonder if Prince Willy will become William V when the time comes, or if he'll take the opportunity to be King Arthur...

Consider olearia for hedges next to the sea. I've seen successful olearia hedges on Inishboffin, way out on the wild Atlantic. Olearia traversii FUTUREFORESTS.IE A large, bushy evergreen shrub with grey-silver foliage. It is many a coastal dwelling that is protected...